Birthday Bard

Sorry for the major gap in programming, here.  It's been a busy past few weeks.  I'll be doing these posts in segments over the next few days to avoid half-assing them.

On February 28th, the day before I officially turned 5 and 1/4, I went to Stratford-upon-Avon to see Shakespeare's hometown.  We met an old local off the train with our Studies in Shakespeare teacher Mandie, and the man gave us just about every tidbit of info on the town we possibly would want to know.  He told us that Stratford was once a sheep-sheering town, but it became more famous for its beer right around when Shakespeare was in secondary school, helping to explain why William was off partying in the cornfields on weeknights, or sometimes alone out there with his eventual wife Anne Hathaway.

We walked past the house where he was born, and a scary man dressed as Shakespeare's ghost was terrorizing children in the neighborhood.  He was curiously attired in seventeenth century clothing, covered in stark white paint, including his pants, his breeches, his stockings, mustache, top-hat, you name it.

"the whining schoolboy with his satchel / And shining morning face, creeping like a snail / Unwilling to school." Jacques, As You Like It

Later we hit up Shakespeare's school, which began in a chapel at 7:30 to morning prayer, then on to translating Greek and Latin until 6 pm on hard wooden benches in dim-lit rooms.  No recess, and classes met every Saturday, too.

Our guide also explained that because Shakespeare's family had no money to pay for college and school in Stratford was free, Shakespeare did not receive the same education as University wits like Ben Jonson or Christopher Marlowe.  We know this, in part, because the the Greek and Latin stories William had to read and translate based many of their rhythms in the iambic pentameter, and, of course, 60 percent of Shakespeare's plays use this verse structure.  Shakespeare had the iambic beat drilled into his creative mind from the beginning.  The university philosophy at the time was to break this mold and find new ways of expressing verse poetry.

We went on to see a matinee production of The Tempest, the last play Shakespeare wrote.  It was a production created in South Africa, with an entirely South African cast.  This production tackled head-on the issue of Apartheid, and for characters like Caliban and Ariel, the theme was a compelling factor throughout the play.  The best part about the production was its use of the space.  I sat stage right, house left, on the side of a thrust stage that protruded way out into the audience.  Being on the side didn't pose a problem, even if sometimes the actors backs were too us because we felt like we were in the world of the play.  (When I saw Twelfth Night at the RSC, it was a proscenium stage, which kept the audience distance from the front of the stage and kept the actors always facing out in a rather tired Elizabethan manner.  Not to say it wasn't good, but I'm finding the thrust is really the more effective venue for engaging an audience--at least in Shakespeare).  Spirits were South African natives with grass skirts and congas, and they even used large, 'Day of the Dead' style puppets for Ferdinand and Miranda's wedding.  The most powerful moment came when Prospero set his slave spirit Ariel free by washing the white paint off his chest with a tin basin.

After the

 show, we made an unsuccessful attempt to visit Shakespeare's grave site.  In my opinion, it was fitting that we didn't see it, because to me it was a sign that Shakespeare is still alive and well.  (Corny, I know, but I had to find some redeeming quality to getting gipped out of seeing the tombstone.)

We got back to London around 8 pm, with plenty of time to drink some beers and break out the mattresses for a birthday "Fight Night," in which my friends and I took over the ping-pong room at the dorm and wrestle till we were tired.  All in all, an excellent 21st birthday celebration!